The trend of the offseason for the Pittsburgh Steelers was to overturn the roster from where it was a year ago, filtering out players that didn’t have much of a long-term outlook for the team and added key guys via free agency, trade, and the NFL Draft to overhaul the bottom of the roster whiles also adding talented pieces that can contribute right away as starters.
Still, one aspect that often gets forgotten when it comes to roster construction is the special teams component and having the right guys on the 53-man roster that can contribute on return units as well as on punt and kick coverage units.
That’s a key aspect that head coach Mike Tomlin hit on in a one-on-one interview with Bob Pompeani prior to kicking off Pittsburgh’s Week One game at home against the San Francisco 49ers. Tomlin mentioned the new return guys as important factors to Pittsburgh’s special teams units this season, but he said a greater point of emphasis has been put on who is covering their kicks and punts this season.
“Our attention from a special teams standpoint is this transition that we’re going through with some of our core coverage people,” Tomlin said to Pompeani on video from the Steelers’ YouTube Channel. “We no longer have Derek Watt, Marcus Allen, Robert Spillane, Benny Snell, guys like that… Arthur Maulet. Names that you heard quite a bit a year ago in terms of tackle producing on teams. And so, we got somewhat of a new core group to go along with Killebrew who’s obviously a returning guy. So that probably has our attention about who is going to ascend within those ranks and provide consistent contributions from a tackle production standpoint.”
Pittsburgh was successful in overhauling their roster from a year ago, seeing key contributors like FB Derek Watt, LBs Marcus Allen and Robert Spillane, CB Arthur Maulet, and RB Benny Snell Jr. walk in free agency. Tomlin mentioned the same thing in his Tuesday press conference, calling this a transition period to replace guys that made up a huge bulk of their special teams production the last few seasons.
Pittsburgh did sign back WR Miles Boykin who is a fantastic special teams contributor as well as still have S Miles Killebrew in tow who was the special teams captain from a season ago, but there is still a lot of roles that need to be filled on those coverage units. One would figure that DB Elijah Riley will fill in a lot on special teams, having made a couple of good plays on coverage units during the season. CB James Pierre is still on the roster and has been a big contributor on special teams as well in the past. TE Connor Heyward also produced nine special teams tackles last year and could see his role grow in that area with Watt gone.
Throw in other names like LB Mark Robinson, WR Gunner Olszewski, and CB Chandon Sullivan, Pittsburgh has several guys that can step up into those roles this season on kick and punt coverage units. That transition period may have some rough patches to start with San Francisco first up this Sunday, but Tomlin and ST coordinator Danny Smith appear confident in the group that they have to be able to get the job done and provide quality play.
